Comfort Risotto

 

Ready to dish up!

 Penzeys Spices would have me believe that "[t]heir [Felon47&Co] plan all along was to have these first 24 hours being about Shock and Awe and breaking the spirits of those who would oppose their cruelty. They want you to go silent. Please don’t go silent." Further, Penzeys believes that cooking is an act of defiance and decency and kindness. Regardless of the logical flaws in that argument, cooking was about all I was equal to on this dismal day, and we did still have a good-sized chunk of peeled butternut squash in the refrigerator that wasn't getting any fresher. So this evening I pulled up Love & Lemon's Butternut Squash Risotto recipe once more and got to chopping.

The mashing innovation

 As it happens, I did not get to taking photos until I was pretty far into the recipe which is too bad: it's a very pretty dish to cook, as well as being damned easy. My innovation on the recipe is to use a masher, at about the point where there's only a cup or so of liquid to add, to smush some of the squash a bit more than it would otherwise get. I also probably go heavier on the rosemary than the recipe calls for because if there's one thing there's no shortage of around here it's despair, errrr rosemary. I mean rosemary.

 

I topped it with some additional cheese, (yet more) chopped rosemary, roasted squash seeds, and a bit of almond. It was excellent.

The first round